Copyright Issues in the Mainstream

dmayle writes "Recently, the Supreme Court of the U.S. ruled on a momentous topic, the Grokster case (as covered on Slashdot). It turns out, however, it's not just geeks who are taking notice, and we're not the only ones who think things are getting ridiculous. The Economist has a great story on the subject, noting among other things, that if the cost of publishing had come down with the internet, perhaps the amount of protection needed to encourage publishing is less as well." From the article: "Both the entertainment and technology industries have legitimate arguments. Media firms should be able to protect their copyrights. And without any copyright protection of digital content, they may be correct that new high quality content is likely to dry up (along with much of their business). Yet tech and electronics firms are also correct that holding back new technology, merely because it interferes with media firms' established business models, stifles innovation and is an unjustified restraint of commerce."

Comments

Status Quo

[DanielMarkham]

This is an excellent article, and one that anybody with a brain could agree with. But it looks like the history behind this (the last 30 years or so) and the high-priced legal firms will do everything they can to keep the status quo.
I'm afraid that we will eventually have to push for a constitutional ammendment to fix this copyright issue -- there is simply too much inertia for the law to catch up with reality. Who knows how long this will take? If you thought the "war on drugs" was fun, just wait until we do about 40 years of the "war on pirates"

See "SarBox And The World of Tommorrow" before it hits the theatres!

um, no

[millahtime]

Copyright was meant to protect the consumers, right?

Copyright was not meant to protect consumers. It was meant to protect the rights of the guy who wrote the material. It is to protect the right of the supplier.

Re:um, no

[d34thm0nk3y]

Copyright was not meant to protect consumers. It was meant to protect the rights of the guy who wrote the material. It is to protect the right of the supplier.

To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries;

Let me repeat that since people seem unable to grasp it so often:
To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts...

Promoting the arts is the goal, protecting the rights is the mechanism!

Re:But..

[alvinrod]

Copyright can protect the consumers by guaranteeing that after a certain amount of time copyright materials are released into the public domain.

Imagine for a minute that some company creates a drug that can cure cancer, AIDS, and a number of other diseases that we can't cure today. The company could choose not to patent this cure in the hopes that no one would be able to discover how it works. If no one could ever figure it out, they could continue to charge whatever they wanted for it, and people would have no choice but to pay or to likely die from their illness.

However, the company can patent it and protect their rights to it for a certain amount of time. If it were 14 years, they would have the sole right to create or allow other people to create the drug. After those 14 years, anyone could freely create the drug. So initially, prices would be high, but after 14 years they would probably hit rock bottom when other companies can undercut the price and get in on the action.

Now which would you rather have, knowledge controled and exploited by the few for as long as it takes someone else to learn that knowledge, or a set amount of time for whoever made the discovery to profit from it before it becomes available for free to everyone.

A patent system allows a winning situation for everyone. Without one, many people wouldn't want to spend time researching a discovery if everyone else will be able to steal it and profit from their hard work. Essentially, the patent system allows for capitalism to work well, provided the patent system isn't screwed up horribly.

Re:90+ years? We're all dead, except the corporati

[cpt kangarooski]

That's a common misconception.

Actually, if the copyright runs out, Disney will lose some of its trademark rights.

This is because a trademark has to indicate that a product must ultimately derive from only a single source. Also, the trademark must be something other than what the good or service it identifies is. That is to say, you could not trademark the word 'Apple' for the fruit of the same name. And note that trademarks are a different sort of animal than copyrights; they deal with different rights and subject matter.

When the relevent copyright expires, Mickey Mouse enters the public domain, and anyone can create works using him. This means that the character is generic, and that there is no longer only one source. Thus the trademark cannot survive, at least with regards to books, films, etc.

It could subsist elsewhere -- there's Peter Pan peanut butter, and Peter Pan bus services, but you can't trademark the character as to creative works.

This is more evident in the patent field (see e.g. the Shredded Wheat case) but is true no matter what. Disney is well aware of this.